“Love the sinner, but hate the sin.”
Love the sinner, but hate the sin.
attributed to Augustine of Hippo
Attributed to Augustine everywhere and written by him nowhere in this form. The nearest thing he wrote is a rule for the discipline of a convent - "with due love for the persons and hatred of the sin" - which is about how a community corrects its own members, not a maxim about how to regard the world.
How this is known
No volume this project holds carries these words.
What Letter CCXI actually says is “with due love for the persons and hatred of the sin” — the persons, not the sinner, and it is a rule for a convent about wanton looks rather than a maxim about the world.
Also by
- Augustine of Hippo every saying recorded of this person, and their page